Yoga Sutras News

There are many interpretations and opinions about the the true identity of the author behind the Yoga Sutras. In this video presentation by Dr. Katyayani Poole, Ph.D. explains the meaning behind the word and/or name Patanjali and Ishvar.

The conference will explore yoga from a broad perspective: it will examine different strands of Indian yoga in the pre-modern period and forms of modern yoga, the changes that occurred within the pre-modern yoga practices and theories.

Already in the oldest texts, such as the Mahabharata (400 BCE- 400 CE) and the Yogasutra (4th-5th century, CE), they are called bala (power), siddhi (achievements) or vibhuti (manifestation of might). In academic contexts these powers were rather neglected since they have often been interpreted as an expression of 'magical thinking'.

Yeats once wrote ‘I know nothing but the novels of Balzac and the aphorisms of Patanjali’. In setting a worldly French novelist against a Indian mystical philosopher, Yeats is not merely recasting the dialogue of self and soul that has governed so much of his poetry; he is signaling that one side